Doosan

At DSE’s newly opened Changsu plant, eagle-eyed personnel wearing protective attire carefully inspect products for any dust or defects. Such a sight is to be expected in the semiconductor plant, however, as only copper clad laminate(CCL), the core material for printed circuit boards(PCB), is manufactured here.

Just two hours by car from Pudong International Airport in China, ‘Doosan Corporation Electro-Materials (DSE) Changshu Co., Ltd.’ acquired the plant from Huawei Electronics of Taiwan last June and launched it as the outpost that will shoulder the future of DSE at an opening ceremony on July 4.

Before DSE’s acquisition of the site from Huawei, the only product manufactured at the Changshu plant was universal CCL, largely due to its aging equipment and a lack of technology. To overhaul the overall level of the plant and make it suitable for production of the latest smartphones, the existing equipment was modified and new equipment was installed. The plant can now produce 0.05 mm CCL, i.e. far thinner than the ultra-thin CCL standard of 0.08 mm.

“The situation looked quite negative since the equipment companies didn’t have the necessary experience, but we were able to secure the manufacturing capacity for top-tier, high-value-added products by fiercely preparing from the R&D stage,” explained Gilsu Jung, the president of Doosan Corporation Electro-Materials Changshu Co., Ltd.

This explains the existence of a cleaning room, a typical facility of a semiconductor plant, in the Changsu plant. To ensure the quality of its high-value-added products, the Changshu plant is equipped with 30% more automated facilities than the company’s plants in Korea. There is a very good reason why Doosan has been putting so much time and effort into establishing Changshu. China accounts for more than 50% of the global production of PCB. The CCL market in China is expected to surge up from last year’s $ 4.3 billion to $ 6.8 billion by 2016. Doosan, the largest CCL company in Korea, is reaching its threshold regarding domestic growth. The future of the company can no longer be guaranteed without expanding into the overseas electronic market with its shorter product cycles and delivery times. This is the background to Doosan’s preparation of its first overseas production base in China since it entered the CCL business 38 years ago.

Some observers have pointed out that Doosan’s overseas expansion is a little late considering the strong demand for overseas production for some time now. However, Hakcheol Kim, the chairman of Doosan Corporation Electro-Materials said, “We would certainly have failed if we had expanded overseas in the past. Now is the right time to enter the Chinese market with high-end technology, since the opportunities entering the competitive Chinese PCB market with a universal product are quite limited.”

Doosan is planning to preempt the future market with high-end products such as Halogen-Free(HF) CCL, Flexible CCL, and Metal CCL. Prompt action can be taken as Changshu is adjacent to Kunshan of Samsung Electro-Mechanics, Wushi of Tripod, and Suzhou of Unimicron.

DSE plans to achieve sales of more than 500 billion won in China by 2016, and leap ahead to become the world #1 in the field of high-end CCLs by 2017. Changshu is its starting point. “A new milestone has been set in our 38-year history. We will grow as a global material component company by establishing our 2nd and 3rd production bases in the near future,” declared Yongmaan Park, Chairman of Doosan Corporation.

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http://www.etnews.com/news/device/device/2610515_1479.html
Source: Electronic Times Internet